that. host: go ahead with your question or comment. caller: we are talking about the state news. that is really interesting. that is really interesting. i keep listening and hearing about this. i shake my head, they want to keep blaming the russians. hillary'sd not write emails. she did. she was the one that did not want to hand them over. that was a complete lie. that is fake news. michelle, i mayor think the world of her, i really do. does now, but she is in what the moles on c-span. c-span has turned into nothing more than cnn or msnbc. host: why do you say that,

bread? it is alwaysse slanted and you are always asking questions of people like myself, and i know you disagree with me wholeheartedly. host: i just asked you what the temperature was today. caller: exactly, you are just diverting. you are a democrat. i really was curious about how cold it was. thank you for the call. i don't want to hang up on you. i appreciate his opinion, i think it is good for all of us to get feedback. just saying this because i am here sitting with you, steve. i tell this to people all the time. what i have to go out on media tours and dissent from my mountaintop in colorado, the thing i always look most forward to is this time and space.

c-span's history is a proud one of doing justice to the first amendment and the privilege we have as information providers. i don't know what your politics are. after all of these years. i think probably that is because inre has been so much bias cable news programming, the ,retense of objectivity listeners and viewers who are not accustomed to great questions and straight, unfiltered delivery of news happening on capitol hill, that they automatically assume there must be bias. this is a horrible thing, if you think about it. are on theirle who cameras have contempt for them. that is something that there ought to be more introspection

about in the elite media circles. instead, they are doubling and tripling down on the same ways of delivering their narratives as they have for the past 30 years. i do want to say he has a point about, for example, the dinosaur networks, who are now on broadcasting hillary's comments and condemning things like pizza gate. but does anyone ever remember robert gate? it was those little citizen bloggers and journalists who are not credentialed were the ones that brought them down, or the exploding trucks on nbc, or even in this past election cycle when it cnn -- i remember jake tapper saying it was journalistically horrifying that there was someone within their organization that was leaking questions to hillary clinton. host: he called it malpractice. one more call.

we love you having on any time, either here or colorado. i will not ask you what the temperature is. please go ahead with your question. caller: good morning. i have a question as far as donald trump is concerned, when will he stand behind his numbers? when will he stand behind what he is really doing and not based off of what he things he is doing? apparently a lot of his numbers over the past have been enormous, and then when you do investigative journalism, the numbers are not true. host: we will get a response, thank you. guest: i'm not sure which numbers she is talking about. i am just going to speculate it is either the job creation numbers in the carrier deal, or

the idea that there were a large who cast votese that were illegal in this election cycle. the knee-jerk reaction to that information, it must not be true , i think, serves a political and ideological agenda. the fact is, we have even academics who don't have any special political interest who have been pointing to the to just sort of reflexively say there is no election fraud in this country is as much fake news as anything else. host: looking ahead to january or february when donald trump his nomination for the u.s. supreme court, what will the battle look like here in washington? guest: bloody. [laughter] for those of us with long memories, the battles over robert fork, will look like

kindergarten. michelle malkin, her work is available online and at crtv. what is the website? rtv.com and i happen to have four episodes available right now. on c-span, waiting for this conversation to begin at the center for strategic and international studies from people working to prevent trafficking and what the international community can do about it. scheduled to start a few minutes ago. theill wait here and see if speakers come to the stage. a discussion on child trafficking and what the international community can do to prevent it.

>> we will be hearing from a panel today from people who work to prevent child trafficking. they will be sharing ideas on ways the international community can partner together to prevent it. running a bit time schedule. , we wille later today

be at a rally with president-elect donald trump on his usa thank you tour. italy making a stop in grand rapids, michigan. that is scheduled to start at 7:00. also tonight oral argument in the seventh circuit court on whether police have the right to search a car simply because it is parked illegally. that case is usa versus randy johnson. that is at 8:00 eastern on c-span2.

>> here at the center for strategic and international studies, getting ready to talk about child trafficking and ways the international community can help prevent it. running a bit behind schedule, this was supposed to start at 1:00 eastern time. it should be starting momentarily. on capitol hill today, the house is out, they finished their

business for the 114 congress. the senate is in before they wrap up for the winter break, including funding the government past midnight tonight. working on a resolution passed by the house yesterday that will extend funding through april of next year. one of the sticking point is a provision for health care for coal miners. action on the senate floor on c-span2. a conversation here about child trafficking starting shortly. >> we are going to get started. i hold a chair here at csi s. we'll be having a conversation about combating child trafficking and supporting survivors to strategic development. it's a real pleasure and honor to do this with my friend and colleague shannon green who runs .ur human rights program here i don't think i have to -- one of the great evils of our age is

the trafficking of persons. bush administration, bush 43, and the obama administration, have worked hard to shine a greater light on this, have tried to take a number of steps both the mystically and internationally to combat this great evil. there are some terrible statistics about this that belie the great human suffering involved with this. 1.2 million children are trafficked each year. i will not go on. i think most of the people in this audience and room are aware of the gravity of this. we have a number of experts that we wanted to bring to washington to have a conversation about this, certainly in the context -- we had an election last month, we will have a new same time, so i the there is a broad republican and democrat consensus that this is and in bothroblem

the last two administration there have been steps taken. i'm confident there are opportunities for taking yet additional steps to solve this terrible problem. fromve hillary chester u.s. conference of catholic bishops. here, thankin is you for being here. hillary, i will ask you to go first. i will ask jean to speak as well. then i know shannon has some questions and additional comments. >> thank you so much. my name is hillary chester, i am with the u.s. conference of .atholic bishops the catholic church has been really engaged on the issue of trafficking since the codification of the law, the

actual the finding of trafficking as a distinct form of exploitation, distinct terminal activity. my office, we house our antitrafficking effort in our office of migrant and review g services. we work closely with our sister organizations, the different offices, catholic charities and developments, agencies across the globe, counsel for the care of migrant people, the academy of social sciences, which is where pope francis asked specifically about the issue of human trafficking be addressed .ore fully my organization, we work with people on the move. here in the u.s. we work with victims and survivors, foreign nationals, either who came as a trafficking scheme. we have seen many young adults and children from northern mexico that are sort of forced, co-worst by cartels to smuggle

drugs, people across the border, and then they wind up year in u.s. custody. we also work with children who have been a part of labor trafficking schemes, some young farms come out of an egg that you may have heard about in illinois, specifically targeted because they were children. there was an expectation that they would be able to get them out of custody and put them to work. but we also see a lot of migrants, including young adults here in the u.s., who are here without status, which makes them honorable. they can fall into trafficking schemes. -- vulnerable. it all takes place in the u.s.. my counterparts abroad work with refugees and migrants, laborers, street children. a some countries -- we had gathering last september at the vatican to look at the issue of trafficking among street children globally.

thinking about the runaway and homeless youth here in the u.s. who are very vulnerable, sexual exploitation in particular. looking at street children in the more traditional terms, much younger children living on the streets often in small groups. vulnerableten very to sexual and labor expectations. we are looking at the issue, we work in partnership, which gives us a good perspective on both fromtrafficking source countries or source communities through transit destinations and back again. we work collaboratively when people who have been trafficked either in their own country or across borders and i want to go back to their home community and need assistance we integrating, so that they are not just we trafficked all over again. >> thank you. jeanne, thank you for being here. jean garin, i'm at the university of wisconsin madison. codirecting a new antitrafficking program called

social transformations to end exploitation. we are focused on sex trafficking. i have had a long-standing interest in child protection globally. i worked on broad-based human rights and child issues at the state department. i wanted to present some ideas that i have been mulling over, talking to people over the years about how we could be using technology better to address some of the challenges of child trafficking around the world. specifically, as it relates to the vulnerability of the lack of identity of children, that so many children, whether in institutions, street children, or unaccompanied migrants, often just let somebody keeping track of their identity. and they often lack for registry as well. my proposed collaborative technology ideas, projects that i think we should consider, i am

calling juvenile life information exchange network. it is a data and technology collaborative to end child trafficking but it's not focused on the perpetrators or the deep web, or the other important aspects of combating trafficking. at riskally focused at children and survivors of trafficking and trying to improve tracking of outcomes for them and improve service provisions through that. here are the verizon abilities that my work at the state department uncovered. the statistics are up there. they come from usaid. theas a id will be one of first to tell you that it is based on very little and conjecture. that is one of the challenges i like to present as a solution that technology could help us all up, by tracking all of these different types of children. after working in places like uganda, hearing the challenges of counting the number of orphans in institutions, the number of street children, or

even a number of ngos working in their country with child welfare , you have government officials in places like uganda, rwanda, who are concerned about children in their countries and the trafficking of those children, but have no way to keep track of them. at the same time, you have social workers, community-based organizations that are resource -poor and are trying to work under difficult circumstances and also need tools to keep track of the kids in their care. i kept seeing the data challenges around the world in these different contexts. back to the university of wisconsin and i'm now part of a statewide antitrafficking task force, one of the working groups on data and research and also identification and screening. as i was sitting in these wisconsin-based meetings with the department of justice, department of children and families, service providers in danger on a who provides

aftercare services for survivors , all of the same data challenges i saw all over the world were propping up. , because weferent have more sophisticated systems in this country, but they are silos. for example, each police agency in every county in wisconsin uses their own technology vendors to keep track of their data. , they areeral level asking for more consistent reporting on trafficking and they are getting that, but all of these different systems being used makes it very hard to share data. of course, not all of it should be shared. here is the mandate of that working group, to identify mechanisms to collect and linked data regarding sex trafficking victims across systems through modifications in existing systems or developing of new systems. it is the developing or modification that i like to talk about. we have some models out there in the business world, in the technology world.

some of you may be familiar with them. but is aned at darpa, open source repository of tools for data capture, mapping, visualization, all the things that the sector needs. some of the collaboration behind darpa on the government side, lots of universities involved in different ways. of course, technology companies and others. they have come together to think isut -- the goal specifically designed for deep web and online trafficking issues, going after perpetrators of online sexual explication through back page or other mechanisms. those are -- that is the goal. what i'm proposing is a mirror or something similar as it relates to identification of at risk children and survivors.

so some of the functions of the data collection, distributed programming, infrastructure, and all of these same functions have potential to be applied on the survivor tracking, child trafficking area with as well. i'm not an expert on memx, so some of you may have more updates on this, but it serves as a model that is out there that we could replicate to get at these global issues. some notional collaboration for julie are listed here. these are -- i am here to rally some support and speak to interested parties about bringing tech companies, the private sector together with various universities. i have colleagues at different universities working with technology in different ways to address some pieces of this challenge. i think if we can together with

some large donors who are also funding different types of technology initiatives, you have macarthur investing quite a bit in citizen science, citizen crowdsourcing, democracy initiatives, human rights tracking. no similar initiatives could be applied to child protection as well. again, the same sort of but with someemex specificity and customization for child specific data capture, improved case management tools that are needed desperately by different levels of organizations around the world. a data gateway for secure about appropriate data sharing, as is appropriate. and then some mapping and analytics as well. at the university, my goal is the research, which is also lacking in the field, and that is in part because we don't have the data to start with.

although hillary and georgetown university has done a great study using some administrative looking at the capabilities of survivors and their recovery. that is exactly the example that we could do more of if we had more of these tools. in wisconsin, we are trying to get a pilot off the ground to work with the task force to build an open source repository of tools and id. then to our child trafficking victim identification needs in wisconsin. most of the states, many have task force is now, but many cannot answer the question how many trafficking victims do we have in our state? we have 50 states. all of these same tools could be developed for our domestic trafficking challenges can be applied to other transnational challenges like the u.s.-central america dynamic of migrants coming to the u.s., often trafficked. we are not able to keep track of them right now.

they are handed over to uncles and then they disappear, etc. we need better tools for tracking them. familynvolved in usaid's first initiative which is continuing work, a design thinking exercise, thinking about the needs for family-based care for children in institutions particularly. betterthe ngos, we need data harmonization, case management, the local government needs tools to track the kids in her district, etc.. there were all of these needs for technology, and there are things being done on a one-off basis by each organization, but i believe we need to invest in a global collaborative to start systematically producing these .ools and customizing them the last example was uganda. i already spoke to some of that.

i'm delighted to be here, thank you for inviting me. i really think the next step would be bringing together some stakeholders who might be interested in participating in a , and i'me initiative hoping to do that sooner rather than later. both of you spoke about partnerships. partnership is often thought of as the fourth pillar of the comprehensive approach, whether it is partnering with tech companies to get better data or the buying and selling of people online, or as we were discussing sessions, closed-door really making sure the private sector is aware of all the vulnerabilities within its supply chain. it seems to me the private sector is an important partner, yet, this field has been in development for the past 15 years. i wanted both of you to speak

about what are some positive examples of private sector engagement and collaboration, and what's are some of the barriers that we need to overcome in terms of building out those kinds of partnerships? context ofin the human trafficking beyond just child trafficking, certainly, some of the companies that do software development have assisted nonprofits around the world, overseas in southwest asia there have been efforts using salesforce and other kinds of data management systems to help improve case management to track cases even, so that when individuals, and seek assistance at an organization and it turns out that may have been trafficked by the same individual, that information is captured in a way where an individual caseworker may have missed because they are speaking to different people. those kinds of connections are not lost and can be passed on to

law enforcement. certainly, technological partnerships, some efforts doing more with cell phone technology, recognizing people in many of the african countries are now using cell phones. much more than computers. ways to enable people to report tips, incidents, or to give them information. safe migration is something that my partner organizations work on, helping people recognize what are good and bad recruiting offers, before they head out, or give them tips that when they get to where they are going, they might recognize a bad offer and stay away, or even maybe reach out for assistance. there is that kind of technology coming into the antitrafficking work. though, the idea of good business partners and cleaning up supply chains is

something that we are struggling with. we are trying to get more information from large corporations about their supply chains so that we as consumers can make more ethical choices, more informed choices. >> so people are not buying products with forced labor. >> we would hope to have that information where you can preferentially support a company that is keeping a good supply chain. -- mye reached out organization has reached out to some in the fishing and seafood industry and we get some pushback, they can only go so far in their supply chain, they cannot be everywhere. and then some of the sourcing, they say, is really beyond their capacity, for some of the raw materials, prime materials in their supply chain. i think that is still definitely an area where people of goodwill should be pushing more for that

kind of information, so we can be consumers that are pushing and amending better treatment for people in the supply chain. >> i think the key to getting business engaged is, obviously, it has to be in their interest to do so. that speaks to their pocketbook and consumers making choices based on clean supply chains. i think there is a hopeful and the key is to focus on what the corporate competency is. it is more attractive to businesses to give what they do, if that makes sense. which is why there is so much potential for the technology building. google already allows its staff to donate 20 hours a month or something to these kinds of projects. at the same time, there are ,ther consortium and coalitions

in the tourism industry, for example, we know they are engaged in that. i cannot speak to the success of all of them. some in the room are more experienced with that. reluctantly, but some have come on board. i think there is the potential emergency shelters for victims, for example. they can post in their hotels, they could make it a corporate code of conduct and except -- accept code of conduct. i think that is a lot of what business coalitions are trying to decide. if we are a part of this, we will sign on to these ethical codes of conduct. i think there is a lot of potential in expanding that, trying to get more businesses to engage in that way. a good example is manpower, the company. that is what they do, they are focused on contributive to the site with their corporate

identity. --let me ask a question we are going to have a new, special ambassador to combat trafficking. u were putting together a memo for the new ambassador, what would be one or two recommendations to build on the last two administrations, opportunities to build on over the last 15 years? there has been a lot of effort, some progress, there have been some gaps. what are some areas -- let's call that low hanging fruit -- for the next person that is the ambassador for trafficking. let's start with you, hillary. >> someone mentioned this earlier, this is not a unique idea, but i think the office needs a longer-term strategic plan.

right now, a lot of their funding decisions, where they fund projects, who they fund, what kind of activities they are funding, our driven by the tip reports. it feels a little bit year to the tip report comes out -- someone is tier 3. it is because they are not getting prosecutions. there is not good shelter. so those become -- >> >the issue du jour. they are pretty standard. it is not super trendy, but it reflects the rankings of the prior year. so it does not feel like there are regional approaches, that there are a lot of spaces to do what i would think would be good collaboration across regions are really multi-your projects that are perhaps the performance

members -- measures are longer-term. that would be my recommendation. speaking of collaborations, one of the things i have always thought was missing was relationships with related areas of practice. for example, the folks that work on education, whether it be the educational exchange programs or the kinds of educational or thes that usaid does, group of experts that do democracy, human rights, and governance work, looking at issues like rule of law and if unity, which are so relevant to this issue, or whether it is people focus on women and girls, or even people focused on transnational crime networks or countering violent extremism, insofar as it relates to terrorist networks. there are all of these connections that i do not think are being made as strategically as they could be.

there is a lot of resources, a lot of expertise, manpower, and tactics that could be leveraged to help deal with this issue. right now, those connections are not being made. walk through the building and get to know the other opportunities to collaborate. >> there has been a danger in tips becoming everything and then nothing, but at the same time, there are push factors related to underlying societal weaknesses, or grievances that push people into other vulnerable situations that could be addressed together, rather than in a silo. the same thing with the pull factors or the facilitated environment. i will act to see more connecting of the dots among the different fields related. >> that was going to be my point. especially -- and this is not the only thing that the tip office does -- but in my experience focusing on child

trafficking, which can provide a lot of support and get a lot of people engaged -- anyways, specifically on that piece of trafficking, there are these great potentials. when i was at the state department working on these various issues, it was so frustrating. you have these different offices, you have child soldiers in human rights bureau, trafficking victims in the tip office, and then orphans and vulnerable children only at usaid, and then another issue at the state department related to intercountry adoption, around which there is corruption, there could be trafficking. these are overlapping issues, so you have the poor counselor of affairs trying to handle difficult adoption proceedings, systems in weak countries with weak regulations. who could benefit? socialally usaid from

protection funding in those countries where those problems are happening. that is to your point. especially when it relates to children, it is the last thing that people are thinking about, but at the same time, it is low hanging fruit. i don't think it would take much at all, just talking with each other saying, this is what we are working on in guatemala. we have challenges in this way from the tip office, or vice versa. strategically using every taxpayer dollar and foreign assistance, state department and , tortment of labor programs address multiple challenges. because we can do that, but it takes coordination. there is a great development from a few years ago in the u.s. national plan on children and adversity. issue,the child-specific that was a heavy lift. came out after a lot of hard work and collaboration. it was the first hole of government plan that came out.

there was no money behind it. i think it is still struggling for implementation, but that is another opportunity for the new administration to seize. >> i want to go back to something that hillary said. one of the connection that is not being made between the humanitarian community and people who are looking at providing services for displaced persons, whether they be refugees, migrants, or the internally displaced. you mentioned the vulnerability of people on the move. i'm curious about that nexus of people getting traffic and those on the move. how could we stitch together a strategy that is much more copper hence it, effective, in terms of catching those vulnerabilities and making sure the people who are closest in proximity to some of those communities have their eyes out and know what to do, if they see signs of trafficking? my organization is very

focused on migrants and refugees, so for us, we have ofught about these periods migration, different places that people can be in a migration journey. sometimes they are a displaced person. sometimes they are seeking asylum. it comes to funding, when it comes to jurisdiction of intergovernmental organizations, ngos, we think in very rigid categories. i'm a refugee-serving agency. i assist people seeking asylum. people that are victims of trafficking. the reality is people are in much more dynamic situations. most migration flows are mixed. people are not just fleeing violence or war, but they are also seeking an opportunity. they intend to work when they get to where they are going. are they an economic migrant, refugee?

these categories, the jurisdiction of who serves them and what services are available are becoming optical to us in this field to really meeting people's needs. first and foremost, we should be meeting the needs of people in front of us, sort of not be so categorical. also recognizing with comes the lack of some social norms and protection that are normally in place. people begin making what we would see it poor choices, given their range of choices. perhaps they are making the best available. that puts children at risk, adults at risk. to mitigate some of those bad allowing adults who are seeking asylum, who are refugees, would work to keep their children from being pushed into the informal economy.

really, these children are doing the kind of work that an adult would do much more efficiently. we had a report recently where refugee services went to jordan, -- i am blogging on a -- to look atanon these serious now living in these cities primarily. there were children working in agricultural fields just outside of the popular areas in both jordan and lebanon. --t was so problematic was it is illegal for adults who are syrian or noncitizens to work. the adults cannot go, they would be spotted and perhaps ejected from the country. so it is a real deterrent to them working, for sure. everyone turns a blind eye to children working. so it is 8, 12, 13-year-olds working in the fields, small

hands. less efficient. an adult could probably do the work probably to the same cost to the farmer. it is almost common sense letting people remain in what are more healthy of making aorms living, supporting their families, even when they are in these incredibly disruptive and unstable situations. an, you want to comment on this? think other thing that i a new ambassador could do with the office, do more effectively -- actually, across the building of the state department, is continuing to make those links between trafficking as a national security issue. most people often just think of it as a humanitarian, human rights -- we have to do this for the moral imperative.

but much like the businesses, you need to appeal to their best interest. similarly, for different departments -- offices in the state department, you need to make sure that you make someone in charge of making those links. if there is not an active trafficking person engaged in some of the counterterrorism or even the sanctions that we place on countries, waivers. i've been involved in debates over whether because there are a child soldier problem in a country, whether they should be waived or not. making the national security argument that child soldiers, it is hard for adults in our military to deal with that. that is a challenge for them because they are not trained for it, let alone the fact that , ife young men or women used as labor in military, militias, become dreams on

society or gang members who are also a threat. that is just one example. in the transnational organized crime networks that you referenced as well, they are often the same people moving contraband and drugs, and people. it is all about what is the most lucrative. working interest in with treasury, other agencies. laundering issue or as a national security issue or counterterrorism issue. generally, -- we haven't always been as effective at making those national security arguments. >> could i ask either of you to talk about a good news story? is there a country where we can say in the last 10 or 15 years

has been an incredible turnaround story? an example of a happy story? i think my organization has provided foster care to four national victims of trafficking alongside our refugee minor population, and we have seen some good outcomes, some positive outcomes. i think there are certainly those individual cases where people come out of traffic situations and are able to rebuild their lives. >> has any country gone from tier 3 to 1? >> i don't think so. we have been working more with the port chaplains in thailand years.t couple of having these court chaplains who can get onto ships, who are able to bring fishermen who are not back to of thailand

their port centers where they can get online, use the computer, call their families, because they are sort of like duty-free zones. they are not being admitted into thailand, but they can pass the city centers. we see this as a great opportunity to intervene what is -- peoplelnerable and cannot contact these fishermen when you're out on these boats. they are really isolated. so we see these port chaplains as a first kind of contact peter we have been building the capacity to recognize trafficking, to be responsive to trafficking. we have been doing that for about two years. the thai government has been intrigued by this, and the last year, has been having our port chaplains alongside their staff training the port inspectors. they have increased the number of port inspectors, they have our port chaplains speaking more from a humanitarian, human

rights perspective. they do joint trainings now, operations -- when they go onto ships, the chaplains accompany them. while the inspectors are speaking with the skippers and captains, the chaplains can speak with the crew and get a more real sense of what treatment is like, what the pay is like, are they getting their share of the catch, what are their working conditions, do they have contracts? we see that as a benefit, in part, because of those activities, thailand went from 3 to tier 2, so at least one level. i think cambodia is also a good example of a positive story. there are still so many issues and lots of things to work on, especially in the orphan tourism area which is linked to trafficking, but through engagement by ngos, international justice mission, state department engagement on training, it has taken many

years, but the prevalence of specifically traveled tracking for sexual exploitation has decreased dramatically. this is also happening in places like the philippines. unfortunately, for every happy story there is a negative counterpart. as an example, in the philippines, some of my ngo colleagues have described, as they have some success in closing down brothels, because they are engaged with physical brothels. their work has improved, they rescuearned how to children, explore what's going on, and rescue. but as they have had success there, more of the trafficking, even in places like the philippines, has moved online. now they are faced with a whole other challenge, which we have here with back page, etc. our challenges here on trafficking and overseas often tend to come together.

think the tip report overall has been very effective in getting countries to make good changes. havingd is an example of a lot of attention, it did well on the sex trafficking area. they have a big state problem. nowfishing industry has also exploded as a huge problem. so they are back down again. it is cyclical. >> that is a good segue to something i wanted to mention. as a human rights person, i do the tip report as a really an important tool. but like manyect, other reports we have in the human rights space, it has teeth. if you find yourself on the tier three, there are punitive measures that can be taken to penalize those countries for not taking trafficking seriously and not trying to meet them in nonstandard. it has been a positive

advocacy tool. i pulled some stats in preparation for this meeting. we needt is not where to be, but this is improvement. since 2009, 1 hundred 94 pieces of antitrafficking legislation have been passed throughout the world. the most recent reporting period prosecutions, 50% more convictions. victims identified when compared to the data from 2009. so we are seeing some improvements. the magnitude of those prosecutions are nowhere near the scope of the challenge, and as long astioned, this is a lucrative business, traffickers will continue to adapt and find ways to make money. but i think there has been some improvement. the other area where i would say

there has been a tremendous amount of improvement is just in awareness raising. people have a lexicon that they understand, whether they use trafficking persons or human slavery, there has been a lot of attention from the u.s. and even within the united nations security council, talking about trafficking. i think it is on the global agenda in a way that it was not 15 years ago. canave a foundation that we build upon. certainly there is more work that needs to be done, but the ground has been laid, i would say. up and taken this two or three questions and why don't we budge them together. you get extra credit if you say your name, organization, and you frame it in the form of a short question as opposed to a soapbox moment. we will hear from mark, this lady here, and then that gentleman there. georgetown full of -- school

of foreign service. on theou have been cutting edge of using technology looking at data with regard to vulnerable children, connecting to trafficking. could you say briefly about where it is more and less useful? businesses, some data firms want to step forward, because that is the tool they have to offer. but because of the danger of sometimes having a hammer and then going to find a nail -- what is that data and technology more and less useful for on trafficking? let's get a couple more first. >> i am with the office of monitoring and trafficking persons. i'm afraid i will do the soapbox thing. >> as long as it short. just wanted to respond, i

really appreciate you sending out an agenda, suggestions for specifically our office. i just wanted to mention two things to complement what you have said. news story in relation to the tip case is the philippines. the were ranked tier 1 for first time in 2016, the only country in the area to do that. that is of course despite moving from a brothel setting to online sexual expectation, which many of our friends work on. it is about the government's response, which has been really tremendous. , in terms ofng is investing in, long-term strategies that you spoke to, i don't know if you are familiar with our child protection contact for worship, the first of which is in ghana, started in 2015. $5 million in foreign assistance over the course of four years.

hopefully totinue be done in more countries. i just wanted to mention that. >> harold von. i'm involved with some work with the rotary club here and in bangkok. the issue coming up is the changing environment, particularly in thailand, but also laos, cambodia, and so on. part of the difficulty in knowing how to apply that information to strategists is it is not always consistent. we get months of information from the embassy, another set of information from a group on the alliance of antitrafficking. some overlap but there are differences, too. basically, my question is, what are you aware of, in terms of the changing environment, particularly in southeast asia , that causes us to

reconsider many of the strategies we have been trying to apply? >> thank you even ok, we had three interesting comments and questions. let's start with you first, jean . question, you certainly do not want to use any technology out there for inappropriate use. in the sector, writ large, there are needs for mobile apps, really simple record management for community-based organizations. there are systems already built out there. it's just an issue of customizing for that purpose. then there are needs for data sharing, data gateways, etc. i think the key to doing this well is getting multiple types of technology companies together with different stakeholders who

are all working on this issue at different levels, from government, state task force, government of uganda, for example, ministry officials, with service providers, ngos who work with different types of vulnerable kids from orphans to issuesl juvenile justice , and bring them together saying this is what we need from the service providers, and let the tech companies here that. i think we have this collaborative mechanism where you start matchmaking. other projects would flow from it. it is not one massive project but a collaborative mechanism to match up the kinds of technology input that the companies may be able to give and apply it to the sector. social workers do not talk to technology guys. even bridging that language cap is a huge step forward. you want to reflect from the gentleman on the rotary club? thehat is great news from

state department, you are doing great work. keep at it. i wish you all the best. i know how hard it is. to the southeast asia questioned, i cannot speak to the details of any of those countries, which i used to follow much more closely. i think it is always hard to get real information against data. it is difficult to understand trends. one of the things in thailand, and it impacts the rest of the mekong region, is that trafficking is not static. it is different in each place, different scenarios of how people are trafficked. you have hotspots of sexual exploitation and movement, but the you have, for example, burmese going into the fishing industry and having these slave ships. so there are these different types of trafficking and labor, sweatshops, etc. it is complex and it can kind of ebb and flow.

another issue that has been close to my heart which underpins a lot of the trafficking that happens of various types in southeast asia, is statelessness and undocumented, unsafe migration. that some policy changes could have a big impact on and the thai government is working on that. they are trying to get citizenship for the people who have been born there and living there for generations. it is a slow process and it needs to move faster. we still need be putting pressure on the thai government to solve some structural issues that cause the trafficking problem. data, my first thought is one of the best uses of data is to have pattern recognition. that in individual would normally miss. to have data that is collected

and analyzed whether that is on a weekly basis that you are looking for risk factors or something that can be done on a quarterly basis to look at trends, you know where your emerging problems are hotspots or industries might be. that is one benefit of having thenthat is corrected and stored so you can look at it with fresh eyes and looked across a lot of people collecting data because you will see trends. the state department began collecting data on children who ,an away from child welfare like foster homes and they had a list that the police department asked child welfare agencies, threetime a child hit runs, if they run away three times and refer them to us and we will look for that child in a way that would not -- would not normally have looked for a 16-year-old or 17-year-old

running away for the first or second time. they had recognized among children they were arresting for prostitution and solicitation charges that those kids had when they ran for -- they had been reported missing or reporting as awol from group homes or residential treatment centers. no one would have recognize that clear pattern if it had not been collected at some point. it became a predictive tool and they could earnestly look for the kids that they knew where particular risk. that was a smart move of data -- use of data. a -- i had not thought through this, the project in ghana. i think of that is the kind of work that usaid or department of labor with their child an excitingthat is development.

imisunderstood the question, know that the environmental changes particularly in parts of southeast asia are impacting people who are working in agriculture or the fishing industry which is driving people moving out of rural interurban settings which puts them at risk for different forms of exportation, driving people to work on fishing boats where they are out to see rather than being able to leave from their home port and fish and show their product create we have seen environmental change. it is heightening vulnerabilities and risk. help people adapt what their livelihoods are to changing environments is so they are pushed into these settings where they are more at risk. >> i feel compelled because no

one from usaid has spoken up. it did under my predecessor make great strides in elevating and integrating. one of the things they did in their 2012 policy was to say trafficking in persons should integrated into other development activities as well as the standalone area of investment. southeast asia has been an area has look for ways to [inaudible] looking at the drivers and factors but how to apply other resources to deal with the underlying factors that make people vulnerable to trafficking. >> thank you. let's get to more comments or questions from the audience if we have any. these two. name an organization and a

question or comment. student atraduate american university. my interest is in counterterrorism. can you discuss the similarities and differences between child trafficking by terrorist organizations or by organized criminal organizations? >> thank you. and this woman over here, please. >> i am a masters and international development candidate at american university. my question is how do you combat trafficking without making life worse or more difficult for the victims. in a lot of cases when there is a crackdown on track faking you mentioned you knocked down brothels and then it moves to the internet. how do you combat trafficking without pushing the victims into worse conditions?

>> can i ask you to reflect on questions and ask rip panelists. let's start with the first question. >> there is emerging evidence s, the sameme network andfickers, the mechanisms tactics are used to traffic a variety of contraband. oil by terrorist groups, being used to traffic historical and cultural religious objects of and it isce, wildlife being used to traffic human beings. it depends on what is the most lucrative and what is the most for these networks to use at the time. we are seeing quite a bit of overlap in the organizations

that are doing the trafficking. and depending on what they have access to and what serves her interest in how they can make money and what pressure they are feeling and what points of access they have, we are seeing a lot of overlap in terms of the kinds of organizations that are doing the trafficking. where you can start to make the argument which is that terrorist organizations are trafficking in human beings as well as all these other materials in order to fund themselves and that is a national security reason why you would want to crack down at least on that aspect of trafficking. >> can i ask our desks to reflect on the second question in particular. >> it is a tough question, as a service organization, we provide services on half of human

services. we also have our foster care program which is much more long-term. becausery difficult when people are coming out of the trafficking situation, they have some immediate needs and those of the ones that service agencies are in place often to -- theose kinds of immediate needs, the basic needs. shelters, not always enough that in places where there are shelters we can often get housing pretty quickly. we can get them to see a doctor and get whatever angering medical issues or urgent medical care they may need. said, get them clothing, put them in touch with their families if that is a safe option. then it becomes difficult. we have to manage expectations and be transparent with what

--e we ask service agencies as service agencies can do. we cannot over-promise because people will wait for those things to happen. if you are over-promising, it can do more damage. which is what you're hinting at. if people are waiting for something to materialize, if it is a job or communication with the family, if it is legal status to stay in a country they feel is a better opportunity than being sent back to their home country, those things do not always work out. there are a lot of factors that play into whether those things will work out for individuals are not. when those fall through or people's expectations are not met, they can spiral down and put people in more honorable situations. what i've seen in with sex , certainly labor trafficking, these are people who are, they have vulnerabilities but they are

your go-getters, people with real ambition, people willing to take risks to get out there, to accomplish something, to support their families, get themselves out of a bad situation into hopefully a better one. in my -- my experience, they do not like to wait around and be assisted. it makes some feel that they are not progressing, that can be very stressful. they want to get back out in bucket -- most cases and get to work, move forward. being honest and being as transparent as we can be as providers is the best we can do. funding for more longer-term services, for less intensive and more extensive services is a model where -- we are thinking more about rather than so much where we are supporting people, trying to get them back in their communities,

get them back with family and then do more long-term but less intensive, check ends, social support. legal assistance, but not being the be all and all for them and then the transition can be ugly. from the outset, let's figure out where you can leave and take care of yourself and i will assist you in a much longer term way. that is a model that we are experimenting with, looking to that as perhaps more sustainable and more fair to the survivor as well. >> we had a lovely event at georgetown university yesterday speaking to some of these issues . human dignity and the well-being of survivors, how do we support the well-being of survivors of trafficking and there is the intention, because of your desire to increase prosecution, you also -- often need the victim to testify and they may

not be ready to do that. one of theseey is issues of human dignity. to make that primary and all the work we do and understand the times trade-offs and where a change or an abrupt change may not be in the best interest of that survivor. it is a case-by-case thing. it is difficult work. i want to make it easier if i can with more tools. it is important to prioritize the human dignity of survivors and their choices of what they want. fundingks it to another priority that we should consider which is mental health assistance and psychosocial support. the development community uses psychosocial. these kind of important aspects of providing services to survivors of trafficking. i worked quite a bit on

gender-based violence in burma. and the women who would come gang-raped inbeen so traumatized. if you cannot get them assistance to heal and process their trauma, their health will not improve, they will not be able to focus on education and they will not be able to hold down a job. all related and it is an overlooked part of the solution. seconds,o guests, 30 what are you optimistic about and this is such a downer of a topic and it is a tough topic. leave us with something you are optimistic about for the future. this is tough stuff. having -- say that been in this field, i am hearing doingurvivors who are really well. survivors that i served in direct service 10 years ago our

-- chipotletivoli and have children. -- have hiredd people to work as case managers. their dignity is what is the most attacked often but people come around and can come out of this and move forward and i think that is very helpful. and just the level of awareness, , of thel of recognition pervasiveness of the crime is also positive. it is helping people realize that this is something through my personal or professional capacity i can in some ways address because it is so pervasiveness

although it is sad is an opportunity for more people to be engaged whether professionally or personally. >> that is what mine relates to, it is the bipartisan nature of the issue and the strange ballot -- bedfellows it can often create. working in him -- human trafficking and child trafficking. it is a bigger issue because many people are supportive once he learned it is a problem, they want to help create in highly polarized political environments, it is a joy to see republicans, democrats, service providers, faith-based working s all round leading around and trying to solve this. what is very difficult issue. together, i think we can do it. that is my hope. >> thank you. please join me in thanking the panelists.